


Six ways to say Leo

by willsolacepositivity



Category: The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-10
Updated: 2020-09-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:14:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26384716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/willsolacepositivity/pseuds/willsolacepositivity
Summary: While Leo tried to pass through life unnoticed, it didn't always work. Here are the stories of six people on whom Leo felt a lasting impression.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 19





	1. Suzie

**Author's Note:**

> Susan Greene was ten when she met thirteen-year-old Leo Valdez, her new foster brother, and fourteen when she saw a photograph that looked so much like him

Leo always wore unmarked clothes. I know this, because I lived with him for almost a year. He even turned the old sweatshirt Dad gave him inside out. When I asked Leo why he did that, he just smiled and said,

_ “When people say ‘a guy in an orange shirt’ you’re searching for anyone in a shirt with a bit of orange in it. But point out the writing, and you lose your anonymity. I like anonymity.”  _ He smiled that smile of his that always made me laugh, at least for a year. 

Another thing about Leo that I remember was how he was always smiling and cracking jokes. Whenever I was feeling down, Leo made me feel better, usually accompanied by something that he made. Leo didn’t bake like Mom or Aunt Linda, but he made something equally special; his inventions. People said that Leo was a genius, and it was easy to believe it from the golf ball- sized engines and whirring contraptions. When I broke my favorite windup toy (I don’t even remember what it was anymore) Leo returned it in fifteen minutes fully fixed, but also able to fly around my head and respond to basic voice commands. For all his charisma, however, Leo never brought any friends home. I didn’t notice it at the time, but looking back I think that he might not have had any. 

Leo also hated fire, so much that even ten-year-old me noticed it. Whenever Dad lit a match to smoke a cigarette, Leo would tense up immediately. Maybe that’s why he left the night that someone committed arson to Leo’s school. 

It started with a desk on fire, for some reason. No one knew why the arsonist had done it, but soon, the whole school was set ablaze. 

That night, Leo left. I was ten, not stupid, so of course I knew of his history of running away, but Leo had promised me that he wouldn’t, that he would stay in the Greene household until he was eighteen. Empty promises of course, but I believed them. All of Leo’s stuff could fit into a backpack, so he was out in a few hours. 

To this day, I remember that night, watching my brother leave me forever. I tried to convince him to stay, but Leo just smiled and shook his head. 

_ “I have to go, Suzie. I’ll visit someday, okay?” _

_ “I’m going to be sad without you.” _

_ “Aw, Suzie. I’m running away for you.” _

_ “But I don’t want you to run away!” _

_ “Later, you’ll look back on this day and be grateful.”  _ He had said the exact same thing my parents did when they grounded me. But I still wonder what “later” is.

All these memories came rushing back to me as I stared at the photo.

“But… it can’t be him.” I stared at the photo on my friend Em’s phone. 

“Look, I just wanted to show you Rachel Elizabeth Dare’s Instagram. How could your long-lost foster brother be on it?” Emma’s eyebrows smushed together, and she looked at me like she wanted to take my temperature. I studied the photo again. Rachel Elizabeth Dare, famous youth climate activist, was in the back of a van marked  _ Delphi Strawberry Service  _ with a group of laughing friends. I recognized Jason Grace, Beryl Grace’s son who had disappeared off the grid before I was even born, and Tristan McLean’s troublemaker daughter whose name always slipped my mind. Both of them were logical company for Rachel, but also in the back of the van were a bunch of other kids I didn’t recognize, including a girl with unnerving golden eyes and a scrawny kid in a giant aviator jacked Dad would have called “shabby”. But, strangest of all, there was Leo. 

“No, I know it’s Leo. He even has the little birthmark above his left eyebrow. Look!” I pointed at the photo. 

“Suzie, you were ten. Surely, you can't remember it. Besides, it makes no sense!”

“Em, I’m not crazy! It’s him. I’m sure.”

“We live in Texas! Leo could never get to New York, much less end up in the back of a Delphi Strawberry Farms van with a bunch of celebrities!” But I wasn’t listening to Emma. I was staring at Leo’s laughing face in the little square picture, trying to make sense of what I was seeing. 


	2. Thomas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thomas; satyr, protector, and nature magic expert has never lost a demigod. Well, except for once

There was only one demigod that got away. Maybe it’s weird, but I have a bit of respect for the guy, despite him marring my otherwise perfect record as a protector. 

I started early, at age twenty-six. Repeating each school year twice (satyr aging sucks) also gave me a heads-up on the lessons, so I could concentrate on finding demigods. I seemed to specialize in Hephaestus and Hestia kids after a while, too, though why I have no idea. Maybe their scent was stronger to me?

When I first saw Leo, I knew he had to be a Hephaestus kid. Partially because Hephaestus kids smell a bit more smoky, but mostly because he had succeeded in building a remote-control tarantula out of pipe cleaners and flashlight parts in an art classroom and was using it to scare the substitute teacher. He positively reeked of demigod. 

After that was the first time I approached Leo. I decided to start it off nice and slow, since I still have a scar on my left hoof from when I cornered a son of Hermes who thought I was crazy. He came around, eventually, but it still hurt like Tartarus. 

_ “Leo, have you ever noticed anything… different about you?”  _ The demigod just stared at me like I was a particularly interesting automaton. 

_ “Don't start with that shit.”  _ The response startled me. I had been stationed a grade above Leo at the time, so we never really interacted. However, he had a reputation as funny, easy going, and lighthearted, if a little distant at times; not at all the sort of person to give that answer. Maybe it was the word “different”; Leo had been singled out as a gifted kid, which in T. H. Fairfield school wasn’t very fun. So after a month, I tried again. 

_ “Leo, I have something to tell you. You’ll probably think I’m crazy, but-” _

_ “Thomas, I know more than you think about all that weird stuff.”  _ Leo’s tone was a bit more kindly this time, as if he was the one trying to show me a whole new side of reality.  __ We were in the cafeteria, waiting in the lunch line.  _ “Now let me be.”  _ Leo went back to cracking a joke to the guy in front of him. I didn’t have any time to process what Leo said before I was joustled to the front of the line and had to order something just to get out of the lunch lady’s gaze. 

Later I thought, did Leo already know about the world of demigods? If so, why was he so keen to send me away? I never got an answer. 

The third time I talked to Leo was also the last. We had both landed in detention (I may have accidentally eaten a chair leg out of worry), but no one showed up to chaperone. We made awkward small talk for a few minutes, and Leo even made me laugh a few times. All in all, it was going pretty well. Of course, the harpy picked that time to arrive. 

She was mid-size, skinny, unlike the ones at Camp, and had bright green plumage. Thomas expected Leo to either scream or not react to the “chicken”, but he just looked resigned. 

_ “Stupid feral hawk thingy.” _ I watched, in horror, as Leo casually climbed out of the window. I lifted my pipes to my mouth, and managed to calm the harpy down within five minutes. 

That night, there was a story in the papers about an orphanage on fire, and a Leonidas Valdez matching the demigod’s description was listed missing. I would have written it off as a tragic loss, if not for what the Council of Cloven Elders had told me when I reported back to them.

_ “Leo Valdez, was it? We’ve had three stories just like yours about him.” _


End file.
